Catching Up and Starting a 'Trip with Twain'

It's hard to believe that it has been almost a month since my last post to this blog. My sister and I were just talking this morning about how fast the month of August went. I have been blogging a lot to my coaching blog because I am trying to finish the first one, 'An Accidental Coach' while I have everything organized for it. When I finish I will start a second coaching blog, possibly named, 'An Intentional Coach". While I have spent a lot of time on the coaching blog I have neglected this one. That's why the title of this post is simply, 'Catching Up'.

I ran my fourth Double Road Race in San Jose; it was a double 5k. A double 5k is a 3k with a break and then a 2k. It was a fun event and my first double 5. I have done 3 double 8ks in the past. The only negative at this particular race was that it took forever to get official results. Over 3 hours from the time I finished racing and awards were announced. The positives far outweighed the negatives though.

Even though it was just the end of August and had been over 100 most of the week in the Valley it had a Fall feel to the air the morning of the race in San Jose and some trees were starting to turn already.

Just a few days before Stacie sent me a picture of an indicator of Fall coming that she saw on her run. I'm really looking forward to my trip to St. Louis later this month.

Our latest two rescues Red and Shorty quickly assimilated into the rest of the pack. It's really amazing how well so many different types, sizes and ages of dogs get along. I think they all just know they've got it made here and don't want to risk messing it up. They both love to spend time with us in the living room and sitting in our chairs or on the couch. Even when we first picked them up they were content to sit in my lap on the ride home. It was as if they had always been ours.

When Shorty came to us she had a huge tumor on her belly and a friend who is a vet tech told us that it was cancer and that there was probably nothing we should do as long as she was comfortable. We hoped to just give her the best life she could have for as long as she was with us. One night she cried most of the night so we took her to the vet and they suggested that she have surgery to remove the tumor. After a very expensive surgery we got to bring her home and she seems to be doing very well. They really are sweet dogs.

I decided to go back to an author that I read years ago, Mark Twain. The reason that I chose him is because of his connection with both Missouri where I am going this month to visit my daughter's family and Northern California and the Gold Country area. Unlike when I did a study of Steinbeck where I reread most of his books I am only going to read select books of Twain's and use them as a guide if you will of places to visit. The first thing I read was his autobiography which provided some insight into the man himself. I will use this blog to document my "Trip with Twain". It'll be interesting to see where Twain takes me.